Times of change in a Brazilian University: Insights from research into the language, literacy and digital practices of academics

Abstract

With the current policy of internationalization of federal universities in Brazil, with the design of an appraisal system, and with the rapid trend towards digitization, there have been far-reaching changes in the day-to-day organization of academic life and in the communicative practices of academics. Before the internationalization policy, the main language of research was Portuguese, but now there is a growing shift to English in some fields. This article focuses on the impact of these changes on the language and literacy practices of academic staff, and on the stances and strategies they have adopted vis-à-vis the changes. It draws on interviews conducted with academics during a critical ethnographic research project carried out in two federal universities in 2019. The focus was on their academic trajectories over time, their techno-linguistic biographies and their views on the changes. I present detailed insights from research conducted with three academics at one of the federal universities.